Author: Ulrich van Suntum

JOHANN HEINRICH VON THÜNEN (1783-1850) was a prominent nineteenth-century economist, who is credited with a number of important anticipations of modern economic theory, such as the concepts of economic rent, diminishing returns, and marginal productivity. For the most of his life Thünen worked in isolation on his agricultural estate, Tellow, in Mecklenburg. According to Nobel Prize winner Paul Samuelson, Thünen “belongs in the Pantheon with Leon Walras, John Stuart Mill, and Adam Smith”. Both the Tellow estate and Thünen`s grave, which has his famous formula for the natural wage engraved on it, can still be visited today.   ULRICH VAN SUNTUM is Professor of Economics at the Muenster University in Germany. He was formerly secretary general of the German Council of Economic Advisors and is engaged in both economic research and policy advice. His preferred areas of research are capital theory, labour economics, history of economic thought, and regional and housing economics. He has written several articles on Johann Heinrich von Thünen, both in German and in English.